LaxtonSt Michael

Monuments and Memorials

Effigies to the de Everingham Family

The de Everingham monuments in the church represent members of the family who died between 1287 and 1398. Pevsner noted that:

the church is proud of its de Everingham Monuments, supposed to represent members of the family who died in 1287, 1341, 1387 and 1398, but poorly preserved. On the tomb of Adam (c.1341) his first wife’s effigy is in stone like his own, but they are in such a poor state of preservation that there is little aesthetic reward in examining them.

This seems unduly harsh.

South side

Robert Everingham

Effigies of Robert and
Adam de Everingham

Robert Everingham, d1287. Mansfield stone. A baron in the reign of Henry II, who made Laxton his principal home; last of the chief lords of Laxton and hereditary chief keeper or custodian of the royal forests of Nottingham and Derby. Knight of King Edward I, and possibly a participant in the crusade led by Prince Edward, 1270-74. Clad in armour of ring-mail.

Adam de Everingham

Baron Adam de Everingham, d1371. Mansfield stone. This was ‘Adam de Everingham de Laxton’, who was summoned to Parliament on 8 January 1371, and fought at Cressy. An early appearance of plate armour, which later became general. Depicted in the attitude of using the sword, held by some to imply that the knight fell in battle. Late example of the crossed legs and the shield on the left arm.

Reginald de Everingham

Baron Reginald de Everingham, d1399. Alabaster. A headless trunk. The sword belt is worn horizontally across the hips and is decorated with metal plates. The sword has moved to the left side, and a new instrument, the misericordia, or dagger, on the right side.

North side

Adam de Everingham and wives Clarice and Margery

Adam de Everingham (c1280-c1336). Aubigny marble. Son of Robert Everingham (d1287), with lion carved on shield. Served in the Scottish war of 1303 and in 1306 Edward I conferred the Knighthood of the Bath on him. In 1309 King Edward created him Baron Everingham, of Laxton, but he later took up arms against the king and was taken prisoner at the Battle of Boroughbridge in March 1322 and had to pay a ransom of 400 marks to secure his release.

His first wife Clarice, died without issue. Aubigny marble.The statues of Adam and Clarice are in white limestone from Aubigny and are the work of the same sculptor, suggesting that they were carved at the same time, possibly about 1325 on her death. She is depicted as wearing the wimple of the period, a handkerchief tied around the neck, chest and chin and caught up behind the head, over which is the veil, here drawn aside, the ends falling down upon the shoulders with a retaining band across the forehead.

His second wife Margery. The oak effigy of Margery (d1336), by whom Adam had a son and heir, Adam, called the younger, is the only surviving wooden (oak) medieval effigy in Nottinghamshire. Head dress similar to that of Clarice.

The three figures are on a tomb probably built c1250 by the Lexingtons and canopied on similar lines to the tomb of Amyer de Valence in Westminster Abbey. Subsequently cut down to form a resting place for these monuments, whose original place would have been in the de Everingham chapel on the south side of the Chancel. The figures have been cut away to fit into their present position.

Location

Although the monument to Adam de Everingham and his two wives looks to have remained in its current location since it was placed there, the other three monuments have moved from time to time. Thoroton (1677) noted ‘three old low cross legg’d stone tombs and a blue grave stone in brass’. He noted also the Everingham lion rampant painted on the breast of an effigy on an alabaster tomb ‘on the south side the Quire’. Cox (1700) referred to ‘three old low cross-legged stone tombs’, which indicates that Reginald de Everingham was then in better condition than today. He noted also a ‘a monument of blue stone, for Mr Roger Morecaunt, Rector, who died December 17, 1438’.

Throsby noted in the north chapel ‘an old tomb almost 6 feet high, on which lie three figures, seemingly a knight and his two wives; but so covered with dust, that I found it difficult to sketch them’. The alabaster monument was ‘in the chancel’, and he noted also in the south aisle ‘a loose head, probably once belonging to the trunk above named. Near which lies part of a cross legged knight.’

When Sir Stephen Glynne visited in 1854 he noted the tomb of Adam de Everingham and his two wives, and a ‘mutilated effigy of a cross-legged knight’ which implies that one of the three monuments now in the south aisle was then in the north aisle. This would make sense, given that the south aisle had been closed off as the school room, but it is unlikely that Glynne would have failed to mention the other two monuments if they had been inside the church.

In 1902 the three effigies lay side by side, but subsequently Reginald was moved to the west and is now the other side of a pillar, making access to the southern chapel easier.

Other memorials

Chancel south wall

A wall mounted monument, well above eye level and now too faded to read.

South wall of the south chapel

EDMUND HYNDE
Gentn.
Buried May the 21st 1739MARY his Wife
Buried March the 31st 1742EDMUND their Son
Died January the 1st 1783
Well known as an honest Man,
And order’d this Monument
To be Erected to their

Memory

REMEMBER
Horace Hennell
1913-1967
Isabella Hennell
1918-1995

This image is in their memory

Chancel north wall

Four polished brass plaques:

TO THE GLORY OF GOD AND IN MEMORY OF
SYDNEY HERBERT 3RD EARL MANVERS
WHO DIED 16TH JANUARY 1900
THIS REREDOS WAS ERECTED BY

HIS LAXTON TENANTS

THIS TABLET IS INSERTED TO THE HONOURED
MEMORY OF CHARLES HERBERT SECOND
EARL MANVERS BORN 11 AUGUST 1778 DIED 27
OCTOBER 1860 BY WHOM THIS FABRIC WAS
RESTORED BUT WHO WAS NOT PERMITTED
TO SEE THE COMPLETION OF THIS HIS

WORK OF CHRISTIAN MUNIFICENCE

REMEMBER
JACK (JOHN) CREE
BORN 24TH NOVEMBER 1898
DIED 9TH SEPTEMBER 1967
THE LAMP IS HIS MEMORIAL

JESU MERCY

PRAY FOR THE SOULS
OF
EDEN CHAMBERS
FLORENCE BARNES
FREDA R. KITCHEN
FAITHFUL MEMBERS OF
THIS CHURCH